McLean, J and Murray, M (2003) The construction of the new Scottish parliament in edinburgh: An opinion poll of the Scottish public and construction industry professionals. In: Greenwood, D J (ed.) Proceedings of 19th Annual ARCOM Conference, 3-5 September 2003, Brighton, UK.
Abstract
The construction of the new Scottish Parliament building in Edinburgh can be seen to be the most contentious building project of its generation. In January 2000, Sir David Steel, Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament, stated, “this building is the most important to be built in Scotland for some 300 years”. However, significant design changes have led to a substantial cost escalation and the completion date has been revised frequently. More recently, a key subcontractor went into receivership with the Holyrood client expected to take a £3.9m loss. Thus, on one view the project can be seen to be a physical manifestation of democracy and on another the hungry media have tagged it as yet another large prestigious public project being over-budget and over-time. This paper examines the views expressed by a selection of 27 construction professionals and 114 members of the Scottish public who contributed to an opinion poll questionnaire conducted in 2002. The results indicate a general dissatisfaction with the management of the project.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | communication; cost escalation; price; public opinion; scottish parliment |
| Index terms: | media, Scotland, questionnaire, construction professional, public project, subcontractor, construction industry, cost escalation, design change |
| Subjects: | practitioner, data collection methods, contractual arrangements, infrastructure engineering, professional development, Geography, economics, industry analysis, sociology |
| Topics: | Information Management, Engineering Principles, Research Practice, Geographical Context, Cost Management, Procurement, Roles and Professions |
| Descriptive scope: | 4 PCTA |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here